Anyone else had the joy of calling Qantas recently? Needed to change a booking that wasn't being allowed to be done online due to 'generic technical error'.
First call I was on hold for 3h 1m, gave up.
Second call was on hold for 4h 12m, gave up.
Now after 7 hours of sunk cost, still no result.
Poll: after 4 hours on hold what would you have done?
good luck OP
i had the same thing as you, couldnt change my ticket online when they were closing the borders.
waited 5hrs and 7hrs on the phone and was disconnected after both.
ending up buying another ticket and successfully arguing that i had no way to alter the ticket at the time. got a refund for the difference on my original return flight (with the new 1 way ticket converted to the rate for a return fare) took about 4-5 months to get my money back (they missed their stated refund date 3 times) and had to complain on twitter to make it happen good luck.
TLDR booked a new ticket and rang back a few days later to convert it into my return leg. eventually got the money back. I did it before the original flight took off tho
oh its worth mentioning i had a full flex ticket your luck my vary with anything else
Call at night.
I found calling during the day (Tuesday) I had a 2 hour wait (I'm a gold member so get the premium queue). When I called back that night (because I needed to change something else) it was picked up in 6 minutes.
Instead of laying off all their attendants etc, they should have retained them for the call centre.
I waited for 2 hours
Took me 3 hrs to get though to change a flight a month ago.
Sorry guys I was in the shitter couldn't answer your calls
Why are people surprised with long call queues? It's like complaining about traffic.
If a lot of people are calling the wait time is going to be nuts as well.
"Just get more staff" argument doesn't work either - the business has it's own budget etc they stick to, they will not have people waiting to get on the phones at short notice.
Waited over 3 hours with ANZ as they didn't think many people would be trying to book their complimentary flight right near the deadline.
That's shocking, I had an issue with my Virgin flights and I called and got through within 5-10 minutes.
Yeah and they also close at 6pm too.
Old Joyce needs to fund his 20m salary some how?
Fly enough to get platinum status and they'll take care of you.
Hey there,
If you want to get a reply , try dialing them in the morning ( 07:00 AM to 07:30 AM). You usually get a response with an 40 to 50 mins. Good luck mate!!
I called a couple of weeks back because they changed my flight times so my flight to Sydney left at 17:05 and the connecting flight from Sydney left at 17:05. I couldn't change it online, so was forced to call.
The wait time was supposedly 2 hours, but I was given the option of a call back. They called back 3 hours later. I'm still waiting for the refund which they say could take 8 weeks.
Hmm my calls normally drop after 1 hour waiting. Thats an unusual amount of time for waiting for someone to answer
Send a letter. That will be quicker.
I find the best time to get through to them is around 6am. If its at night, forget about it!
If you’ve ever tried to call Qantas before, you have the pleasure of waiting hours on hold, with the call often hanging up after you have already waited. You’d think it’s 2022 and you’d be able to do everything online, but not with Qantas. We spent about 12 hours on hold over 2 calls and my friends and family as well.
Has anyone had the same problem when calling Qantas? Obviously during the period it’s busier, but these ridiculously long wait times have been going on for a few years now. Don’t know why they can’t just hire more people to answer calls or better yet make all the functions available online so people don’t need to call.
12 hours on hold over 2 calls? Bloody hell, if I'm on hold for more than about 20 minutes I usually give up and try again later. It'd be easier to just drive to the airport and get them to sort it out there.
It'd be easier to just drive to the airport and get them to sort it out there.
11 hours easier.
They actually removed their airport service desks last year lol.
@Presence: Outstanding service! which answers why the phone wait time is in weeks not minutes.
so what do you do if you need help <2hrs before a flight?“
so what do you do if you need help <2hrs before a flight?
Call them!! They said anything you'd need to do could be done online, which is obviously BS.
Yes its atrocious and always seems to be like this. I wonder the same thing about hiring more. Like I get that they only care about money and saving, but its like something you can do from home as well and this many hours is just too long. It also gets me why their site is so buggy too, considering they only really have one job to do (sell plane tickets) and they've been around for so long.
IMO I know I haven't thought it through, but I feel like if you can't call a company within 2.5 hours on average, they're not allowed to say they have a phone service. And thus if you're unable to get something fixed from their website then the blame is on the company. Maybe this should include government also. IDK its just gets to me sometimes.
Sorry to hear it's so terrible. For comparison, I've been calling Singapore Airlines multiple times over the past few months. Each time I have been on hold for 1 to 1.5 hours before an operator answers.
I’ve been calling JAL and it’s usually 10-20mins.
Seen a few posts like this over the last few months, so "normal", BUT should be better.
Hi,
Read the OP but I'm missing the "why" of the phone call.
(That'd be a good place to begin).
Seems like https://www.qantas.com/au/en/manage-booking/change-flights.h… you can do lots of usual things online…
well, i had to try call virgin to change a flight just before last Christmas as I had initially booked a direct flight to ADL but they had changed the flight twice n it was changed to stopover at Melbourne…so when i tried to go online to change the flight, it says I can't do that online as it's now a multistop flight…i tried to call twice, 1st time i waited abt 1 hr n my colleague suggested hanging up n try calling again, sometimes better chance of speaking to the operator sooner, so i hang up n tried again, but still waited about another 2hrs b4 the operator answered. I told her n she apologized, cos of having to wait for 2 hours just to sort it out in 7mins…so i feel for the OP, 12hrs is unacceptable!
In April 2021, I had to call Qatar Airlines a few times. It never took longer than 10 minutes to speak to someone.
It can be done, but Qantas just doesn't care. They should have transferred staff to their call centres instead of making them redundant.
That was a looong time ago. Give it a try now and let us know how long the wait is.
Maybe only white Caucasian male applying for support and there is a shortage in the LGBTQ+ community.
Obviously customer service is an afterthought for such business :(
I called Qantas yesterday to follow up on a refund. Was told the wait time was in excess of 3 hours!
I didn't even bother waiting and hung up.
which is what they hope you do ;)
Waiting hours for a call back in December a few times and the delays and customer service were as bad as each other. Sadly I have no other options than with Qantas.
I've written to them via their website and used their chat to get refunds processed in the past year or so. Found writing to them via their website to be the best if you don't need an instant response. They got back to me within a few days, definitely slow, but no effort from my end and did not have to wait on the phone.
The only company ive had the pleasure of calling is amazon. They are brilliant.
And Ebay and HSBC
Qantas knows very well that Aussies will keep choosing to fly with them no matter what. So why should they waste money hiring more customer service staff?
It's nice to help out and all and I do love Ozbargain but just a thought - it won't be much of a 'solution' if it's posted everywhere publicly, especially on an extremely popular website…..
Yes it is atrocious - I have had the pleasure of booking at RTW points trip with them, probably spend in over 50hours on hold over 20 calls. Due to flight cancellations, flights just being deleted from booking without cancellation (or explanation or notification).
Last week were were in Finland, looked to check into our flight the next day out of Finland, and it was removed from booking. First person hung up when they put me on hold (call stayed connected, as it still sent me through to phone survey), 2nd disconnected. Third finally solved it, but its an absolute pain in the arse.
Appauling customer experience. Any other industry and people would just go elsewhere.
Like others have suggested, just tweet the company, they normally buck up their ideas when the feedback is public.